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I had big plans for my year end TV post to finally dive into podcasting to discuss my list with my TV viewing-and-life partner. I did a good amount of prep so we wouldn’t stumble around the whole time, gave my wife the hard sell to convince her to humour me (a pattern in our relationship), and set aside a night to record (cutting into valuable TV watching time). We talked for about 2.5 hours, going over the greatness of the year in TV, each of the top 20, and a little bit about different shows that missed the list. Sure, that’s a long podcast, but with editing and splitting, I think it would’ve been a fun two-parter. It was all pretty cool… until I realized that I completely screwed up the recording (largely due to the high potentiality that I forgot to hit the “record” button before we started).

We thought about redoing it, making it shorter in the process, but never got around to it. Now we’re over two months past the end of the year, which is a little late to be talking about the previous year of a continuous medium like television. Not only are we past the point of relevance for such a list, the past two months for fresh content makes it pretty difficult (how do you talk about a show in terms of 2010 if it’s continued to run new episodes since then?).

But… I already made the list. And the internet isn’t going to break if one more list is added to it, even one that’s a little late to be relevant. After all, I didn’t spend my time watching all or at least a majority of 41 different shows to not tell people what I think of them. So even though it’s entirely unlike me to do so, I’ll be posting them without comment, since I’ve already spent 2.5 hours sharing my thoughts with my number one reader on these, in addition to thoughts I already typed in last year’s Andy TV Awards and thoughts I’ll share in this year’s awards. But I’d love to discuss any show here if you’re interested, so leave a comment and we can chat.

It’s time once again for one of my signature posts: the fifth (and probably final) Andy Movie Awards, where I select not only who I think should win the awards being handed out this Sunday, but also who should’ve been nominated with those winners. There’s a lot of posts around this time of year where writers predict who they think will win Oscars, and some about they think should win. But unless you’re the only person in the world who agrees completely with the Academy’s nominees, it’s a false choice. What if your winner wasn’t nominated? What if you’re forced to choose the only worthy nominee in a group of junk?

Instead, I write a super-long post that basically amounts to a series of specified year-end lists, not only for the big awards that people care about, but also the other awards that most people don’t. The only Academy Award categories for feature length films that the Andy Awards don’t cover are Best Achievement in Editing (because I don’t know enough about the process to pass judgement, as with most viewers, I only notice editing when it’s bad), the two sound categories (as it’s not something I notice while watching movies), and Best Original Song (because it’s a stupid award. Instead, I’ve substituted it for my own award).

To make my decisions, I’ve seen 66 films that had a North American release date in 2008. The Academy nominated a total of 36 feature length films, of which I’ve seen 27 (75%). When you take out the ten films nominated in the foreign language and documentary categories (only four of which were released outside of LA/NY… I caught three of those), I’ve seen 24 out of 26 (92%), with the exceptions being Defiance (nominated for Original Score) and Australia (nominated for Costume Design). Thus, whenever my nominations divulge from the Academy (other than in those four categories), it’s because I disagree, not because I don’t know. Which brings me to why this very well may be my last post of this nature: I can’t imagine myself finding the time in the upcoming years to watch this many movies again.

This one’s a couple days late, but I didn’t feel like lugging around the laptop one more day and didn’t feel like writing when we got home from our last screening. I’m home now, and ready to put the whole whirlwind trip behind me. It was a great time, but I’m glad to be home with my couch and my dog. So here’s one more day of TIFFing before I get back into the routine of the real world.

Read on for musings on Chocolate, The Real Shaolin, and Miracle at St. Anna, plus a couple of wrap-up thoughts…Continue reading →

Time to review the theatres themselves. Thus far, we’ve only been to three of the different theatres showing festival screenings, with two others to experience later this week. A majority of our screenings have been at the Ryerson Theatre, which is a large amphitheatre for the college, seating 1200 people. This is the third big venue for the festival, following Roy Thompson Hall (home to the big gala premieres) and The Elgin Theatre (home to the Visa Screening Room, which features other big gala premieres and second screenings of stuff from the Thompson). Screenings at those two theatres aren’t eligible for use with our Festival Lite packages (which is, of course, complete bullshit – especially when it comes to repeat screenings at the Elgin. I can understand reserving gala premieres for those willing to pay $40, but repeat screenings? This is what has shut us out of films like Burn After Reading, The Duchess, Rachel Getting Married, and The Good, The Bad, and The Weird). So the Ryerson is the only place we can go for third-tier gala premieres (such as Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Slumdog Millionaire, and tonight’s The Brothers Bloom), and the odd big name repeat screening (Passchendaele, RocknRolla). Luckily, because it’s such a big venue, we were able to get into all the screenings we chose for it, and have always been able to get seats where we want (which is generally close to the front to get a good view of the celebs, and off the side as close to the aisle as possible).

The bad side of the Ryerson is that it’s a pretty shitty place to watch a movie. The sound is fine and the picture quality is great (using Dolby Digital when they can), but the seats are terrible, meaning that you spend most of the film squirming from one uncomfortable position to another. The washrooms are also a mess, down the stairs and across a hall, with the ladies room usually a solid 15 minute wait (of course, the dude’s line is never that long, so I’m good. But I can still sympathize for my wife, right?).

The Scotiabank Centre is your typical modern cineplex, with comfy seats, cup holders, and stadium seating, plus fast food in the concourse. It’s also the only one that lets us line up inside, so that’s a nice touch on the rainy days (oh, and Kim wants me to add that it takes our Scene card for concessions). No complaints there, although you’re not gonna get any premieres here (that said, Ed Harris still showed up to introduce Appaloosa). The AMC is a new venue, similar to Scotiabank in that it has the modern amenities of a multiplex, but better. Every theatre is digital, the seats are more plush, the armrests pull up so we can sit closer to each other without the barrier, there’s a nice individual snack plan. So far, AMC is our favourite venue, with the only flaw being that they make you wait outside (although today we able to get out of one screening in time to walk into the next, foregoing the line). Too bad there’s no AMC theatres where I live.

Read on for musings on The Wrestler, More Than a Game, The Dungeon Masters, and The Brothers Bloom…Continue reading →

When you wait for a screening to start, you generally have to wait outside (except at the Scotiabank Centre), and if you want to get a good seat you have to wait outside for awhile. Companies looking to push samples of their product on people thus have a captive audience, which has led to us receiving a lot of free shit, some good, some bad. So far, we’ve gotten two free cans of Red Bull, a couple Dole Fruit Sparklers, a mini-bag of Starbucks coffee beans, a couple other coffee-related samples (I didn’t pay attention since I don’t drink coffee), two t-shirts, a bag of rice chips (sucked), some stupid hand puzzle, and a pair of mini binoculars (which we haven’t needn’t since we wait in lines to get good seats and all, but could come in handy for the upcoming Neil Young concert I suppose). But nothing today. Hopefully this doesn’t mean the end and is merely a result that we tended to stay indoors today because of the rain (both subway stops had indoor entrances to where we were leaving and arriving). I’m still hoping that the Sun Chips people are trying to expand their influence… I love those things.

Read on for musings on Food, Inc., Slumdog Millionaire, and Zack and Miri Make a Porno…Continue reading →